Man, but this is confusing.

CDBurnerXP gave me the alert previously cited when I d/l'ed the 64 bit version. d/loading the 32 bit version and it works fine.

D/l the 64 bit version of Etcher which I need to use. Run it and a big white square opens with a tiny logo and balenaEtcher in the upper left-hand corner.

D/l the 32 bit version of Etcher...same thing.

Right clicking, clicking, etc., in the white square produce nothing.

Might this have anything to do with the fact that I am using a free copy of Windows which I have not activated?

As already instructed, visit BIOS for report. It could be Dell put that 64 bit CPU onto a motherboard that only supports 32 bit. Or, the BIOS might have a switch to disable 64 bit, which would be useful for a 32 bit OS with low installed RAM.

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IIRC, Etcher is an Qlectron (embedded browser, more or less) application. That could be part of your problem. That is an older CPU, did you give it some time?

Trying to run a 64 bit Windows application on Win32 *should* give you an error. It could be an issue of missing libraries or frameworks as well.

Check out Rufus - https://rufus.ie/en/. Many people have success with it. Their site says 32 bit or 64 bit Windows, "it doesn't matter," which leads me to believe it's a Win32 application and you should be ok.

Someone mentioned a 64 bit CPU in a mainboard that only supports 32 bit. Things don't work that way. However, early on in the 64 bit era, and even later on cheap hardware with low memory, vendors installed 32 bit Windows as it was faster - it used less resources on the same hardware. It's quite possible this is what Dell did. To verify, you can check the System Information applet of Control Center, it will tell you the 'bit-ness' of the version you're running. If you can't figure it out, you can not go wrong with Win32 apps. Win32 will work on Win64, but not the other way around.

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I surprised myself by getting as far as: "finally, write your ISO image to your flash drive, and eject when complete"

The command that unmounted the USB disk was: % diskutil unmountDisk /dev/disk6

I have to admit to being stumped at the next step: "finally, write your ISO image to your flash drive, and eject when complete"

Followed by: sudo dd if=/path/to/iso/image of=/dev/usbblahlbah
diskutil eject /dev/usblblahblah

I help a lot of seniors with Mac problems, know how frustrating it can be, and understand if you are reaching the "Jeez, do I have to hand hold this guy the whole way?

If I have not exhausted your patience: how do I write an ISO image to a flash drive that has been unmounted?

As posted you are probably running a 32 bit Windows on a 64 bit PC.

In the Windows system about page it should show what version i.e. 32 or 64 bit is installed.

I could swear that I posted this, but I can't find it anywhere in this thread.

Following the instructions I found to install Mint on a USB drive, I dowloaded Etcher.

When I ran it, instead of getting what was pictured on the Mint instructions, I got a huge white square covering about 80% of my desktop with a tiny icon and balenaEtcher in the upper left-hand corner. Clicking, right clicking, etc., nothing worked.

Anyone care to offer an opinion on this?

I assume you are running XP but need clarification. Etcher does not support XP. Windows 7+ has builtin capability to burn an ISO file to CD/DVD

You should be able to write the ISO file to USB drive from your Mac without installing anything extra using the dd command.

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No longer running XP. I was able to update to Windows 10.

I have been bouncing through so many screens loaded with info my head is spinning.

Do you have any inkling as to why Etcher won't work in Windows 10 on that Dell?

You have to find the device which you want. Those commands are run in a terminal.

* Plug in the USB device, and run Disk Utility. I can't remember offhand the exact terms, but near the top of the window, there should be a dropdown for "Show all devices", "Show only volumes" or similar. Choose the "Show all Devices" option.
* Select the device on the left hand side. Make sure everything is correct. It will likely list the manufacturer and a model number. Click on it, and the right pane should change and show you the capacity and other details. Make sure it's the one you want.
* In the right hand pane near the top, you should see a label that says "BSD Device: ". That's the name of the device that you want to plug into the dd command. So, if it says "BSD Device: disk2"
* Select any partitions, click "unmount" if it should be automatically mounted.
* Close Disk Utility. IIRC it *may* lock the device and the terminal commands below may complain the device is busy.
Your dd command in the terminal should look like:
(with dd do not forget the "/dev/" part in of=, or you'll just create a copy of the iso in the current directory called "disk2").

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I don't why Etcher does not run. Bad download/install?

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I decided to just go ahead and install Linux Mint.

I followed the instructions here: https://itsfoss.com/install-linux-mint/ and everything went exactly as was outlined in the instructions.

I am not interested in keeping Windows and so I chose to install Linux Mint and remove Windows from the HDD.

The last thing in those instructions was to remove the DVD and press [Enter], which I did.

Next came a few windows where you chose the language, etc. and then the instructions were to wait for [Welcome to Linux] screen.

That was three hours ago, during which three hours the Dell is showing a black screen constantly with this:

[11176.followed by four numbers] and SQUASHFS error: unable to read data cache entry (more numbers)

and...

[11176.followed by four numbers] and SQUASHFS error: unable to read page, block (more numbers)

So just now I shut the Dell down, powered it back up, got the Linux Mint logo in the center of the screen, followed by a log-in screen and password, and, eh voila, Welcome to Linux Mint.

Good grief, Charlie Brown! I am off and running at last.

May I thank each and every one of you for all your patience and for your guidance and advice.

Jarhead.

Improvise
Adapt
Overcome
(USMC)

That 11176.xxxx is a timestamp.

The squashfs error is possibly because you ejected the disc. SquashFS contains the filesystem for the installer and such. The installer told you to remove the disc, it probably should have told you to do so after rebooting or shutting down.

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I followed the instructions which worked up to that point.

Well, all's well that ends well and after shutting the Dell down and restarting, I've run across no problems.

Having been a Mac user all my life, this is - so far - a lot easier to get used to than I thought would be the case.

So glad I found this site!